Nationwide there is a certain frustration about paying utility bills. So much so that people jokingly refer to the experience as paying “futility bills”. These jokers probably view their electric and gas bill as something someone does to them rather than something that they do to themselves, but in all cases it is true that if you do not have a meter you will not have a bill. It’s easy right? Just call those bastards up today and say, come and get this thing out of my yard- or off my house or whatever; then, no bill. Some frustrated bill payers have actually done this and gone “off the grid” with generators or alternate energy systems that include wind and solar. Being your own power company sounds cool, but if it was that easy, more people would do it.
The first thing that you need to know about utility bill paying, is that you are going to be paying one for the rest of your life – one way or another. You may be off the grid and get all your energy from wind and photovoltaic power, but unless you paid cash for that system, you are making loan payments that amount to a “utility bill”. Once you pay off the loan there may be minimal maintenance expenses, but it won’t be zero. And, if you have batteries, in seven to ten years they’ll need to be replaced – so there will always be some type of “utility bill” in time, effort or cash to keep your lights on and beer cold. Even if you get a rental deal where the landlord pays the utilities, a portion of your rent payment covers the utilities. The only way out of paying for utilities is to not have a meter and to not use any electricity or gas of any kind, period.
Why do I make a point of saying “not have a meter and not use any electricity or gas”? Aren’t they the same thing? No. Electric and gas meter costs are coming down, but they are not free. No utility is going to give you a free meter. You will be paying for your meter through a minimum monthly fee on your bill or the meter expense will be built into your energy use fee.
Your Load - In utility language, your house or business is a “load”. This means that your building needs electricity or gas and depending on a long list of variables you either need a little electricity or gas or a lot of electricity or gas. So you are either a little load or a big load or something in between – but in all cases, if you need electricity or gas, you are a load. You will sometimes hear the term “demand”. This is a synonym for “load” because you – or at least your building is “demanding” electricity or gas. This is the source of the term “demand side management” or DSM. If your utility has DSM programs, they are trying to manage the demand, usually downward, to reduce the supply that they have to come up with.
Residential electricity is billed by the kilowatt hour (kWh). The “W” in the abbreviation is capitalized in reference to James Watt. One kilowatt hour is the energy used by a 1,000 watt load in one hour. For example, if you turn on ten 100 watt bulbs for an hour, you use 1 kWh of electricity.
Propane gas is generally billed by the gallon. Natural gas is generally billed by the Therm, or 100 cubic feet (CCF).
It seems elementary, but utilities are businesses. They have to make money to cover their expenses just like any other business. If they are an investor owned utility, they must be concerned about share holder profits. If they are a municipal utility they must be concerned about the needs of the citizens in their city and if they are cooperative utilities, they must meet the expectations of their members. All utilities cover most of the expense of getting the power to you by charging a rate per unit (kWh or CCF). The more you use the more you pay.
All utilities buy wholesale energy, electricity or gas and “distribute” it to customers like you; hence the term “distribution utility”. All utilities have wholesale power expenses and distribution expenses. In most cases the wholesale expense is fifty to eighty percent of the retail rate. All utilities have fixed expenses and variable expenses. Fixed expenses are those expenses that occur whether or not there is a load or demand; like the cost of insurance, depreciation, equipment, billing and administration. There are literally billions of dollars of power poles, wires, pipelines, transformers and meters sitting there across the nation ready to spring into action when you flip the switch or turn the knob. Those expenses don’t go way just because you don’t need electricity or gas this month. Variable expenses are those expenses that change with the load or demand placed on the utility’s supply. The more you use the more your utility has to buy.
Your Bill - In addition to the unit of energy billed, there is usually a minimum monthly charge. Some utilities call this charge an availability of service fee. This fee generally tries to recover the fixed operating expenses mentioned above. If you don’t have a minimum monthly charge on your bill, those fixed charges are rolled into your unit rate. There are pros and cons beyond the scope of this week’s blog for both ways of billing. The more your bill is based on a per unit rate the more control you have over the size of your bill.
Every utility bill payer should know the price per unit (kWh or CCF) and the minimum monthly charge that they are paying. You don’t buy gas for your car without looking at the price per gallon so don’t buy electricity or heating fuel without knowing the price. The number of kWh or CCF used during your billing period will be on your bill. Really, it is there so keep looking. The price per unit is not always on your bill. We are back to that pesky sixth grade math.
You can calculate your rates by simply dividing your total bill by the total units that you used during that billing period. See Table 5.6.A. Average Retail Price of Electricity to Ultimate Customers by End-Use Sector, by State, August 2008 and 2007(Cents per kilowatthour) on the Energy Information Administration website to find local average kWh rates.
Natural gas bills may have a confusing list of other charges that make it hard to find a per unit cost. And, while most residential bills come in units of hundred cubic feet increments (CCF or Therms), statistics a generally listed in thousand cubic feet (MCF). The Energy Information Administration statistics on the average price for natural gas make it harder to compare with your bill.
Every utility payer should also know the billing period for your bill. If you are billed one month for thirty days of use and the next month for 20 days of use, the size of your bill will be different even if you use the same kWh of electricity or the same CCF of gas every day.
The main thing to realize about your utility bill is that it is all under your control. You can elect to never use any electricity or gas or you can pick and choose the appliances and equipment that you buy which directly affects the size of your utility bill.
Deposits – Unlike the gas station, when you buy natural gas or electricity, you don’t pay until after you use it. This means that by the time you pay your first utility bill after moving, the utility has given you at least a month and a half worth of their expensive product without getting paid. And, if you drop dead after seeing your first bill they are out a lot of money. So, most utilities will either check your credit history or require a deposit.
How to complain about your bill - Before you call, look at the meter reading dates. Maybe your son or daughter invited the whole high school football or volley team to spend the weekend during this time and you just forgot about it. Maybe you had the flu and cranked the thermostat to fight the chills.
Stay calm; screaming, or profanity will not serve you well when dealing with utility employees. They have heard it all. They have already heard whatever question, complaint, excuse or threat you are about to tell them, so just chill. Make sure you have your bill in front of you so you can give them your account number. This also helps you stay focused on your complaint and way from inappropriate comments about their relatives or anatomy.
If you think your bill is too high, ask them to help you determine if this is an actual or estimated bill. There should be a code on your bill that will tell you this, but sometimes it’s hard to find.
Next, ask for help verifying the number of billing days. I once thought I had a big bill only to find that last month’s bill was for 22 days and this month’s bill was for 33 days. Sometimes holidays or personnel scheduling screws up the meter reading schedule.
Other things you can ask about include the weather. Some utilities keep track of the weather during billing periods as a service to their customers. Colder or hotter weather usually mean higher utility bills.
If you still can’t come up with a reason that your bill is higher than expected you can ask to have your meter tested, but be careful what you ask for. Meter testing is performed on a meter test board in the meter shop. This means that you are getting a new or refurbished meter if you ask for a test. Most meters are simple mechanical devices. And, like your car, they don’t speed up when they are having trouble. Most utilities have a testing and replacement schedule set by state law. Once in a while you can catch them with a meter that has been in the field too long, but if you do, chances are your bill is going to be higher, not lower after the change. All meter exchanges have to be carefully documented so don’t assume that there is any monkey business going on. Deliberate discrepancies are easy to catch and most utility employees like their jobs.
If none of your questions or requests result in a lower bill, it’s time to tour your house. Obvious problems like leaky hot water faucets, well pumps that never turn off due to line leaks, broken thermostats, stuck valves and things that were left “on” when you thought they were “off”, often trigger more energy use. My favorite discovery during an energy audit for an angry customer was the space heater, plugged into a tool shed with the door left open in January. It’s less embarrassing to take that tour by yourself.
Phantom loads have gotten a lot of press lately and can increase your electric bill by several dollars a month. Phantom loads get their name from the fact that the energy used doesn’t give you anything immediately tangible, like light or toast. These loads result from those remote control devices that are always on. You should have a handle on this problem after you get that appliance meter mentioned in last week’s blog.
Thank you for completing Utility Bill Paying 101. If there is ever anything about your utility bill that you don’t understand, let me know. I’d be glad to help, for free. No I won’t pay your bill for you. Nice try. I will do my best to take the confusion out of what it is you are paying as well as help you wade through a bill interpretation. Just email me. ( mrdaily@markricharddaily.com)
If it’s something you have to do every month for the rest of your life, you might as well get good at it. Understanding what you get from your gas and electric utility gives you one less thing to worry about and makes it less like paying for gas and electric futilities.
© Mark Daily, 2008
Showing posts with label Energy Conservation- Coal. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Energy Conservation- Coal. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
What will you do when your area runs out of electricity? - Preparing for Future Electricity Demands
Ignoring the title question is like an ostrich hiding its head in the sand when attacked by wild dogs. Guess which part of the anatomy gets bitten first? So it could be with us, if we all ignore the facts when it comes to getting electricity to our homes and businesses.
Electricity users throughout the United States and Canada are being ostriches unless they actively ask their elected Representatives to deal with the question, “how can we power the future without destroying the planet or making electricity a luxury few can afford”.
“Summer peak demand in the U.S. is forecast to increase over 135,000 MW or 17.7 percent in the next ten years with committed resources projected to increase 77,000 MW or 8.4 percent
(including uncommitted resources, 123,000 MW or 12.7 percent).” Source: NERC 2007 Long-Term Reliability Assessment
No matter which study or forecast you review, the answer comes out the same. We will not have enough electric power to meet our needs in as little as two years, if our current (pun intended) behavior doesn’t change. It the NERC assessment is correct we will have 5 percent less electricity than we need when 2018 arrives in less than ten years.
Don’t be an ostrich, take action. If you are a member of a rural electric cooperative your supplier belongs to the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association. They created a website that makes it easy for anyone to contact their elected representatives. I did it in about five minutes and you can do it too.
Go to https://www.ourenergy.coop and after reading that page, scroll down to the line that says "Contact your electric officials and begin the dialogue now". When you click the arrow at the end of this line, you will be asked to fill out your name and address to email your US Senators and US House of Representatives with the following message:
Our country faces a crisis as electricity use increases faster than available supply. I believe that by unleashing American ingenuity we can solve this problem. What are you doing to speed the development of new technology which will allow me to have the electric power I need while meeting our national climate policy goals? I look forward to your answer and will share it with my friends and neighbors. Thank you.
Then click “Send Message”, that’s it. You don’t even have to know who your representatives are. By filling in your name and address your message will automatically be sent to the correct representatives and you will get a brief confirming message listing which representatives were emailed on your behalf. It’s easy.
Let me know who it went and what you think about it.
© Mark Daily, 2008
Electricity users throughout the United States and Canada are being ostriches unless they actively ask their elected Representatives to deal with the question, “how can we power the future without destroying the planet or making electricity a luxury few can afford”.
“Summer peak demand in the U.S. is forecast to increase over 135,000 MW or 17.7 percent in the next ten years with committed resources projected to increase 77,000 MW or 8.4 percent
(including uncommitted resources, 123,000 MW or 12.7 percent).” Source: NERC 2007 Long-Term Reliability Assessment
No matter which study or forecast you review, the answer comes out the same. We will not have enough electric power to meet our needs in as little as two years, if our current (pun intended) behavior doesn’t change. It the NERC assessment is correct we will have 5 percent less electricity than we need when 2018 arrives in less than ten years.
Don’t be an ostrich, take action. If you are a member of a rural electric cooperative your supplier belongs to the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association. They created a website that makes it easy for anyone to contact their elected representatives. I did it in about five minutes and you can do it too.
Go to https://www.ourenergy.coop and after reading that page, scroll down to the line that says "Contact your electric officials and begin the dialogue now". When you click the arrow at the end of this line, you will be asked to fill out your name and address to email your US Senators and US House of Representatives with the following message:
Our country faces a crisis as electricity use increases faster than available supply. I believe that by unleashing American ingenuity we can solve this problem. What are you doing to speed the development of new technology which will allow me to have the electric power I need while meeting our national climate policy goals? I look forward to your answer and will share it with my friends and neighbors. Thank you.
Then click “Send Message”, that’s it. You don’t even have to know who your representatives are. By filling in your name and address your message will automatically be sent to the correct representatives and you will get a brief confirming message listing which representatives were emailed on your behalf. It’s easy.
Let me know who it went and what you think about it.
© Mark Daily, 2008
Monday, August 11, 2008
Clear Skies is a Lie
I can’t figure out why the public isn’t outraged over the obvious disregard for human health that comes with provisions of President Bushes’ Clear Skies Act. This is just one in a long list of legislation proposed by the Bush administration that does the exact opposite of its title. The Clear Skies Act makes our skies less clear by so many measurable standards that the title could only have been selected by a room full of comedians. Clear Skies? I don’t think so.
According the National Resource Defense Counsel, “The Clear Skies legislation sets new targets for emissions of sulfur dioxide, mercury, and nitrogen oxides from U.S. power plants. But these targets are weaker than those that would be put in place if the Bush administration simply implemented and enforced the existing law! Compared to current law, the Clear Skies plan would allow three times more toxic mercury emissions, 50 percent more sulfur emissions, and hundreds of thousands more tons of smog-forming nitrogen oxides. It would also delay cleaning up this pollution by up to a decade compared to current law and force residents of heavily-polluted areas to wait years longer for clean air compared to the existing Clean Air Act.”
Zachary Roth writing for the Columbia Journalism Review put it this way, “It’s not just that the Clear Skies reduction targets are “little different” from what would be achieved by simply enforcing the Clean Air Act. It’s that Clear Skies, despite its name, would actually lead to more pollution than the existing Clean Air Act, because current law calls for further reductions over time.
In other words, either Clear Skies or strict enforcement of the Clean Air Act would make the air cleaner than it is today. But enforcing current law will achieve greater reductions than would Clear Skies”.
According to Energy Central Ken Silverstien “In February, a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C. ruled that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency had violated the Clean Air Act by refusing to make mercury reductions mandatory. Instead, the Bush administration had proposed a voluntary cap-and-trade system that it says would have reduced mercury emissions by 70 percent by 2018.”
Yet cap and trade means that those that can trade, create hot zones of mercury pollution that may exceed responsible mercury pollution standards.
The NRDC says that “Mercury can cause serious neurological and developmental damage, including birth defects, subtle losses of sensory or cognitive ability, and delays in developmental milestones such as walking and talking. Power plants are responsible for 34 percent of all mercury emissions, which settle into our waters, where they accumulate in fish. In 41 states, officials warn against eating fish from mercury-contaminated lakes and rivers.”
Are people really so busy that they can’t rally enough vocal opposition to this blatant attempt to court irresponsible industries? Are we so strapped financially that we can’t keep our air clean enough to avoid health problems?
If this is all about money why aren’t the taxpayers outraged at the expense of treating air pollution related illnesses and diseases. It has to be less expensive to prevent the pollution than it is to treat all of the health problems associated with dirty air. Yet, people remain focused on complaints about the high cost of electricity without realizing that they are going to have to pay more money for health problems than they would for prevention programs.
I just don’t get it. Can someone out there explain it to me?
According the National Resource Defense Counsel, “The Clear Skies legislation sets new targets for emissions of sulfur dioxide, mercury, and nitrogen oxides from U.S. power plants. But these targets are weaker than those that would be put in place if the Bush administration simply implemented and enforced the existing law! Compared to current law, the Clear Skies plan would allow three times more toxic mercury emissions, 50 percent more sulfur emissions, and hundreds of thousands more tons of smog-forming nitrogen oxides. It would also delay cleaning up this pollution by up to a decade compared to current law and force residents of heavily-polluted areas to wait years longer for clean air compared to the existing Clean Air Act.”
Zachary Roth writing for the Columbia Journalism Review put it this way, “It’s not just that the Clear Skies reduction targets are “little different” from what would be achieved by simply enforcing the Clean Air Act. It’s that Clear Skies, despite its name, would actually lead to more pollution than the existing Clean Air Act, because current law calls for further reductions over time.
In other words, either Clear Skies or strict enforcement of the Clean Air Act would make the air cleaner than it is today. But enforcing current law will achieve greater reductions than would Clear Skies”.
According to Energy Central Ken Silverstien “In February, a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C. ruled that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency had violated the Clean Air Act by refusing to make mercury reductions mandatory. Instead, the Bush administration had proposed a voluntary cap-and-trade system that it says would have reduced mercury emissions by 70 percent by 2018.”
Yet cap and trade means that those that can trade, create hot zones of mercury pollution that may exceed responsible mercury pollution standards.
The NRDC says that “Mercury can cause serious neurological and developmental damage, including birth defects, subtle losses of sensory or cognitive ability, and delays in developmental milestones such as walking and talking. Power plants are responsible for 34 percent of all mercury emissions, which settle into our waters, where they accumulate in fish. In 41 states, officials warn against eating fish from mercury-contaminated lakes and rivers.”
Are people really so busy that they can’t rally enough vocal opposition to this blatant attempt to court irresponsible industries? Are we so strapped financially that we can’t keep our air clean enough to avoid health problems?
If this is all about money why aren’t the taxpayers outraged at the expense of treating air pollution related illnesses and diseases. It has to be less expensive to prevent the pollution than it is to treat all of the health problems associated with dirty air. Yet, people remain focused on complaints about the high cost of electricity without realizing that they are going to have to pay more money for health problems than they would for prevention programs.
I just don’t get it. Can someone out there explain it to me?
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Alternate Energy Advocates need to Get Real
Electricity is today, by almost any standard, a requirement for modern life.
A nation-wide system of unrelated companies makes electricity, a product that cannot be seen, stored or stockpiled and gets it delivered to every corner of the nation through a series of wires connected by thousands of different companies, 24 hours a day for 365 days a year.
This product reaches the customer at the exact moment that the customer wants it- even when the customer doesn’t know they want it. If too much electricity is delivered, things start melting. If too little electricity is delivered, things start melting. This is not like gas for your car. There is no gauge showing a low tank so you can head to the filling station. This is a product that most homeowners only think about when it isn’t there or when the price goes up.
The back bone of the electric power generation system consists of thousands of power plants spread across the country. Most are located strategically near urban load centers or sources of fuel. Usually, sources of fuel, like coal or wind or hydro power, are nowhere near urban load centers.
Base-load fossil fuel is stockpiled allowing power plants to schedule power production to meet anticipated loads. When power plant schedulers get it right, nobody notices. When they get it wrong, rolling brown-outs or black-outs inspire months of government investigation and reams of customer hate mail focused on those utilities that left them in the dark or melted their ice cream. Wholesale power suppliers pay various contract penalties for being short on generation delivery if they under produce or waste electricity and ratepayer’s money if they produce more than is needed.
Because of the ability to schedule these base-load fossil fuel systems, they are called “dispatch-able”. Schedulers dispatch power at varying levels targeted every thirty minutes to meet your electricity demands. They do it based on formulas that consider historic loads, predicted weather conditions and anticipated load growth. Wind and solar energy are not “dispatch-able”.
Based load power plants have an excellent track record of meeting the nation’s needs. As a whole, they achieve an astounding 80% production output that combines with back-up power generation and regional inter-connections to provide electricity at your house almost 100 percent of the time.
Renewable power production facilities have a track record of 25% output. As renewables become more plentiful and spread over wider geographic areas, this “production” factor will improve. Increased reliability through diversity has long been a goal of renewable energy advocates. The Rocky Mountain Institute is one group supporting this concept. Their recent research in the July 2008 issue of their Solution Journal describes how that might come about.
Utilities, have historically appeared to drag their feet about including wind and solar power into their generation portfolio. This is not because they dislike clean power, but because they feel like a 25 % production track record does not meet the needs of their customers. From their perspective, every kilowatt of wind or solar power generation must be backed up with equal base load generation to cover the 75% of the time renewable resources fail to deliver power. In a business dedicated to reliable power at the least cost, the expense of supporting renewable energy means building redundant base-load coverage.
Until customers get “real” about alternate energy expectations there will always be conflict between customer expectations and utility’s ability to deliver.
A nation-wide system of unrelated companies makes electricity, a product that cannot be seen, stored or stockpiled and gets it delivered to every corner of the nation through a series of wires connected by thousands of different companies, 24 hours a day for 365 days a year.
This product reaches the customer at the exact moment that the customer wants it- even when the customer doesn’t know they want it. If too much electricity is delivered, things start melting. If too little electricity is delivered, things start melting. This is not like gas for your car. There is no gauge showing a low tank so you can head to the filling station. This is a product that most homeowners only think about when it isn’t there or when the price goes up.
The back bone of the electric power generation system consists of thousands of power plants spread across the country. Most are located strategically near urban load centers or sources of fuel. Usually, sources of fuel, like coal or wind or hydro power, are nowhere near urban load centers.
Base-load fossil fuel is stockpiled allowing power plants to schedule power production to meet anticipated loads. When power plant schedulers get it right, nobody notices. When they get it wrong, rolling brown-outs or black-outs inspire months of government investigation and reams of customer hate mail focused on those utilities that left them in the dark or melted their ice cream. Wholesale power suppliers pay various contract penalties for being short on generation delivery if they under produce or waste electricity and ratepayer’s money if they produce more than is needed.
Because of the ability to schedule these base-load fossil fuel systems, they are called “dispatch-able”. Schedulers dispatch power at varying levels targeted every thirty minutes to meet your electricity demands. They do it based on formulas that consider historic loads, predicted weather conditions and anticipated load growth. Wind and solar energy are not “dispatch-able”.
Based load power plants have an excellent track record of meeting the nation’s needs. As a whole, they achieve an astounding 80% production output that combines with back-up power generation and regional inter-connections to provide electricity at your house almost 100 percent of the time.
Renewable power production facilities have a track record of 25% output. As renewables become more plentiful and spread over wider geographic areas, this “production” factor will improve. Increased reliability through diversity has long been a goal of renewable energy advocates. The Rocky Mountain Institute is one group supporting this concept. Their recent research in the July 2008 issue of their Solution Journal describes how that might come about.
Utilities, have historically appeared to drag their feet about including wind and solar power into their generation portfolio. This is not because they dislike clean power, but because they feel like a 25 % production track record does not meet the needs of their customers. From their perspective, every kilowatt of wind or solar power generation must be backed up with equal base load generation to cover the 75% of the time renewable resources fail to deliver power. In a business dedicated to reliable power at the least cost, the expense of supporting renewable energy means building redundant base-load coverage.
Until customers get “real” about alternate energy expectations there will always be conflict between customer expectations and utility’s ability to deliver.
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
Climate Change and the Tooth Fairy
Every once in a while I find myself in one of those conversations that begins with someone saying, “I don’t believe in Global Climate Change”. To me, the issue of Global Climate change is not a matter of belief or disbelief. When the world talks about Global Climate change or politicians or scientists talk about global climate change, they are not talking about a belief at all really. I mean not like “do you believe in Big Foot or the Tooth Fairy”.
Here is the difference. So far no one has been able to cite a documented observation, clear photographic record, or reproducible experiment evaluated by confirming peer reviewed data or evidence on either Big Foot or the Tooth Fairy. A peer group of four year olds might all agree that the tooth fairy does exist, but we should expect a higher degree of professionalism from the scientific community about the issue of Global Climate change.
To that end, a group of scientists have in fact gotten together to look at all of the available data, various studies, some modeling scenarios and a host of other scientific documentation relating to global climate and temperature variations. This data not only covers historic records kept by people, it also includes scientific estimates of historic temperatures, snow and ice levels, based on agreed upon methods of ice core sample research etc.; along with current information.
The results of this work was printed recently in a report called,
An Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. This report also included a summary of the findings. This summary, approved in detail at Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Plenary XXVII (Valencia, Spain, 12-17 November 2007), “represents the formally agreed upon statement of the IPCC concerning key findings and uncertainties contained in the Working Group contributions to this Fourth Assessment Report” according to their web site introduction.
Everyone that cares about the facts relating to climate change owes it to themselves and the people that may roll their eyes behind their backs when they announce that they do or don’t “believe in global warming”, to read this summary. And, after a winter like we’ve had this year you can just imagine the debate. However, when you look at the numbers and compare studies and ask consistent questions, the facts, according to this Assessment Summary, seem to point to a real change in the temperature of the globe, with shrinking ice and snow fields and rising ocean levels all pointing to unprecedented increases in global temperature.
Then of course the next question would be, “is this a natural change or a man made change?” This same assessment says it is probably a man made change. Now I don’t just mean “probably” like someday I’ll probably have car trouble, I mean that there is a real likely hood based on the evidence that the climate is warming more rapidly now than any natural conditions would predict or explain. The study goes on to say that this trend is consistent with trends in the production of green house gases created by human activity.
Far from being the “hoax” that some headlines flaunt, the issue of climate change cannot easily be dismissed after reading this summary. If climate change is our fault, then the next question becomes, “what if anything should we or can we do about it”?
The impacts to the world wide human and animal communities predicted in the IPPCC Assessment are not cheerful. Their predictions do not show a happy ending. And, of course, since everyone agrees that no one can really predict the future, until it’s too late to do anything about, this is where any thought of corrective action and who foots the bill will get bogged down. The resulting gridlock debate will make the US Senate look like a decisive action oriented group of rational, objective and logical thinkers
I think we are all too hung up on taking action to stop Global Climate change. There are many compelling reasons to take actions that will help reduce man’s impact to the climate that have nothing to do with helping to reduce man’s impact to the climate.
For example, driving less, or buying a vehicle with better gas mileage ratings, will save you money in the long run. Driving less gives you more time to do other things that might be more fun than driving. Aside from the climate change issue, gas prices will continue to rise, not because burning gasoline is or isn’t changing the climate, but because the more we use the less there will be and when there is less of something that people want, the price goes up. Throw into this discussion the possibility that our purchase of gasoline supports people that are trying to kill us (terrorists, communists and other “ists”) and you have to ask yourself, “geez, why would I want to use gasoline at all”?
Now gasoline conservation by itself will not solve all climate problems, but it keeps your money in your pocket. So if you have no clue about how to reduce your driving, Google “Reduce your driving”. You’ll find all kinds of ideas.
Next time I’ll get into ways you can cut your home heating fuel use and how to evaluate your options. I’m trying as many of these ideas as I can afford. I want to spend my money on fun things, not on gas and utilities.
Here is the difference. So far no one has been able to cite a documented observation, clear photographic record, or reproducible experiment evaluated by confirming peer reviewed data or evidence on either Big Foot or the Tooth Fairy. A peer group of four year olds might all agree that the tooth fairy does exist, but we should expect a higher degree of professionalism from the scientific community about the issue of Global Climate change.
To that end, a group of scientists have in fact gotten together to look at all of the available data, various studies, some modeling scenarios and a host of other scientific documentation relating to global climate and temperature variations. This data not only covers historic records kept by people, it also includes scientific estimates of historic temperatures, snow and ice levels, based on agreed upon methods of ice core sample research etc.; along with current information.
The results of this work was printed recently in a report called,
An Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. This report also included a summary of the findings. This summary, approved in detail at Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Plenary XXVII (Valencia, Spain, 12-17 November 2007), “represents the formally agreed upon statement of the IPCC concerning key findings and uncertainties contained in the Working Group contributions to this Fourth Assessment Report” according to their web site introduction.
Everyone that cares about the facts relating to climate change owes it to themselves and the people that may roll their eyes behind their backs when they announce that they do or don’t “believe in global warming”, to read this summary. And, after a winter like we’ve had this year you can just imagine the debate. However, when you look at the numbers and compare studies and ask consistent questions, the facts, according to this Assessment Summary, seem to point to a real change in the temperature of the globe, with shrinking ice and snow fields and rising ocean levels all pointing to unprecedented increases in global temperature.
Then of course the next question would be, “is this a natural change or a man made change?” This same assessment says it is probably a man made change. Now I don’t just mean “probably” like someday I’ll probably have car trouble, I mean that there is a real likely hood based on the evidence that the climate is warming more rapidly now than any natural conditions would predict or explain. The study goes on to say that this trend is consistent with trends in the production of green house gases created by human activity.
Far from being the “hoax” that some headlines flaunt, the issue of climate change cannot easily be dismissed after reading this summary. If climate change is our fault, then the next question becomes, “what if anything should we or can we do about it”?
The impacts to the world wide human and animal communities predicted in the IPPCC Assessment are not cheerful. Their predictions do not show a happy ending. And, of course, since everyone agrees that no one can really predict the future, until it’s too late to do anything about, this is where any thought of corrective action and who foots the bill will get bogged down. The resulting gridlock debate will make the US Senate look like a decisive action oriented group of rational, objective and logical thinkers
I think we are all too hung up on taking action to stop Global Climate change. There are many compelling reasons to take actions that will help reduce man’s impact to the climate that have nothing to do with helping to reduce man’s impact to the climate.
For example, driving less, or buying a vehicle with better gas mileage ratings, will save you money in the long run. Driving less gives you more time to do other things that might be more fun than driving. Aside from the climate change issue, gas prices will continue to rise, not because burning gasoline is or isn’t changing the climate, but because the more we use the less there will be and when there is less of something that people want, the price goes up. Throw into this discussion the possibility that our purchase of gasoline supports people that are trying to kill us (terrorists, communists and other “ists”) and you have to ask yourself, “geez, why would I want to use gasoline at all”?
Now gasoline conservation by itself will not solve all climate problems, but it keeps your money in your pocket. So if you have no clue about how to reduce your driving, Google “Reduce your driving”. You’ll find all kinds of ideas.
Next time I’ll get into ways you can cut your home heating fuel use and how to evaluate your options. I’m trying as many of these ideas as I can afford. I want to spend my money on fun things, not on gas and utilities.
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Why Environmentalists think Electric Utility Executives are a pain.
Environmentalists view utility executives as part of the cause of global climate change and resource pollution rather than as the defenders of low cost reliable energy that electric utility executives view themselves being. This disconnect between executive’s self image and the environmental community image has several sources. One is the media attention focused on electric utility problems and mistakes. Enron leaps into mind as does the California billing crisis. Unfortunately every mistake from Three Mile Island to Florida’s recent blackout feeds an impression that electric utility executives make important decisions without including the public in their decision making. These media reports have been long on fearful emotions and short on engineering details. It comes down to the idea that people tend to fear what they don’t understand and utility executives have not been at all successful at improving the public’s understanding of the utility business.
The other source of this distrust goes back many years.
In an address to the National Association of Science Writers in New York on September 16, 1954, US Atomic Energy Commission Chairman Lewis L. Strauss was talking about nuclear power and said, "It is not too much to expect that our children will enjoy in their homes electrical energy too cheap to meter; will know of great periodic regional famines in the world only as matters of history; will travel effortlessly over the seas and under them and through the air with a minimum of danger and at great speeds, and will experience a lifespan far longer than ours, as disease yields and man comes to understand what causes him to age. This is the forecast of an age of peace." (N.Y. Times, August 7, 1955)
Now that the future has arrived we all feel cheated since few of these predictions have materialized. The promise of electricity “too cheap to meter” hits especially hard as rate increases nation-wide reminder us of the failure to reach this dream. So, we have to blame someone and who better to blame than people we don’t really understand, electric utility executives.
And of course, electric utility executives encourage a certain amount of persecution simply by the way they conduct business. If they manage an investor owned utility, their allegiance is to stockholders and investors whose primary interest is the biggest return on their investment. If they lead a municipal or member cooperative electric utility, their allegiance is to their diverse constituents. Some constituents believe we must explore alternate energy resources, demand side management and energy conservation while other constituents simply want the cheapest way to keep beer cold and light bulbs working.
While the environmental community buys the whole global climate change scenario, utility executives generally remain skeptical about the role of power generation in climate change.
Al Gore included this quote in his book about the subject that seems to apply here.
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.” Upton Sinclair
Utility Executive are well educated and experienced. They have seen a lot of history and simply don’t buy the premise that mankind is powerful enough to alter the planet’s climate. A common agreement about facts remains a barrier of distrust between utility executives and the environmental community. Many “green” concepts and the load reduction possibilities of energy conservation are also viewed skeptically by utility executives because in their experience customers don’t use these programs, even when they are well advertised and free.
To add to these differences in world view, they tend to over-estimate load growth because it takes so long to get new generation and transmission facilities in place. They feel the only way they can avoid the rolling blackouts of the Northeast several years ago or more recent sustained power outages in southern Florida is to have lots of facilities approved and ready to go.
The rewards for succeeding with energy conservation and demand side management are not equal to the penalties imposed for poor power reliability.
Utility executives refuse to talk about anything but base-load coal generation because when real numbers are compared, they do not see how renewable energy or energy conservation can meet the demands for electricity based on today’s energy use growth trends. Yet, if they stand up and say these things, environmentalists respond with personal attacks and polarizing comments. This only increases the resolve of utility executives to push for business as usual. It forces them to retreat into protective policies that lack transparency.
Balancing the diverse needs and desires of electric utility customers is not for the faint of heart. Yet, from the looks of things today, it is clear that utilities must do a better job of explaining a boring but necessary business to a busy and misinformed public. "We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology." - Carl Sagan
And, this lack of knowledge will continue to haunt utility executives for many years. Their refusal to discuss facts about alternatives because they think it is a waste of time, money and effort will continue to be the primary reason that environmentalists think electric utility executives are a pain in the… you know what.
The other source of this distrust goes back many years.
In an address to the National Association of Science Writers in New York on September 16, 1954, US Atomic Energy Commission Chairman Lewis L. Strauss was talking about nuclear power and said, "It is not too much to expect that our children will enjoy in their homes electrical energy too cheap to meter; will know of great periodic regional famines in the world only as matters of history; will travel effortlessly over the seas and under them and through the air with a minimum of danger and at great speeds, and will experience a lifespan far longer than ours, as disease yields and man comes to understand what causes him to age. This is the forecast of an age of peace." (N.Y. Times, August 7, 1955)
Now that the future has arrived we all feel cheated since few of these predictions have materialized. The promise of electricity “too cheap to meter” hits especially hard as rate increases nation-wide reminder us of the failure to reach this dream. So, we have to blame someone and who better to blame than people we don’t really understand, electric utility executives.
And of course, electric utility executives encourage a certain amount of persecution simply by the way they conduct business. If they manage an investor owned utility, their allegiance is to stockholders and investors whose primary interest is the biggest return on their investment. If they lead a municipal or member cooperative electric utility, their allegiance is to their diverse constituents. Some constituents believe we must explore alternate energy resources, demand side management and energy conservation while other constituents simply want the cheapest way to keep beer cold and light bulbs working.
While the environmental community buys the whole global climate change scenario, utility executives generally remain skeptical about the role of power generation in climate change.
Al Gore included this quote in his book about the subject that seems to apply here.
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.” Upton Sinclair
Utility Executive are well educated and experienced. They have seen a lot of history and simply don’t buy the premise that mankind is powerful enough to alter the planet’s climate. A common agreement about facts remains a barrier of distrust between utility executives and the environmental community. Many “green” concepts and the load reduction possibilities of energy conservation are also viewed skeptically by utility executives because in their experience customers don’t use these programs, even when they are well advertised and free.
To add to these differences in world view, they tend to over-estimate load growth because it takes so long to get new generation and transmission facilities in place. They feel the only way they can avoid the rolling blackouts of the Northeast several years ago or more recent sustained power outages in southern Florida is to have lots of facilities approved and ready to go.
The rewards for succeeding with energy conservation and demand side management are not equal to the penalties imposed for poor power reliability.
Utility executives refuse to talk about anything but base-load coal generation because when real numbers are compared, they do not see how renewable energy or energy conservation can meet the demands for electricity based on today’s energy use growth trends. Yet, if they stand up and say these things, environmentalists respond with personal attacks and polarizing comments. This only increases the resolve of utility executives to push for business as usual. It forces them to retreat into protective policies that lack transparency.
Balancing the diverse needs and desires of electric utility customers is not for the faint of heart. Yet, from the looks of things today, it is clear that utilities must do a better job of explaining a boring but necessary business to a busy and misinformed public. "We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology." - Carl Sagan
And, this lack of knowledge will continue to haunt utility executives for many years. Their refusal to discuss facts about alternatives because they think it is a waste of time, money and effort will continue to be the primary reason that environmentalists think electric utility executives are a pain in the… you know what.
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Why Utility Executives Think Environmentalists are a Pain in the Ass
Utility Executives think environmentalists are a pain in the ass for many reasons, but the main reason is because the language that environmentalists use to talk about utilities and utility executives hurts their feelings. Oh you won’t get them to admit it. Utility executives often have engineering or accounting backgrounds and these professions are not exactly known for their warm and fuzzy emotional types. But, still, environmentalists create immediate walls of distrust and antagonism just by choosing annoying words to frame their points of view.
Think of your own profession or job. Would you like it if people referred to what you were doing with words like “toxic”, “destruction”, “degradation”, “waste”, “monopoly”, “cancer” or my favorite derogatory word “spew”. What have you been spewing today? Did you spew your product on anyone?
How about degradation? Have you degraded anything today?
While most businesses secretly wish they were monopolies, no one likes to be accused of being one. It just isn’t the American way.
So, imagine recent headlines referring to the electric utility industry. Oh, I know, I am going to exaggerate a little for effect, but still you can imagine a headline like this in your local newspaper.
“Electric Monopoly Spews Toxic Destruction Degrading Air quality linked to Cancer”.
It’s like the old conundrum “when did you stop beating your wife”? Environmentalists lead with a verbal left hook. And, it seems like the only reason they would do that is to get headlines or make someone angry. If you had a neighbor with a barking dog or a messy yard, you wouldn’t storm over there demanding and accusing, unless you just like fist fighting. You’d get to know them first and find out if there were extenuating reasons for their behavior. Chances are there is more to the story. You know that. And the Electric Utility industry is in the same spot, there is more to the story. In fact, all of us that love our computers, televisions, cold beer, toast, light after dark, and inexpensive consumer goods, are all – the rest of the story.
Today we are stuck in what peace activist Adam Kahane calls “debating”. We have each side shouting their view of the facts hoping to drown out the other’s argument. One side says, “We can power the economy with a combination of wind, solar and conservation”. The other side shouts back, “No we cannot, the load growth is too large, we must use fossil fuels and expand nuclear power”.
What can we do about all of this? We can and must do two things. Stop wasting electricity and stop wasting words about solving environmental problems. I did not say stop using electricity (we can’t). Nor did I say stop having conversations about environmental problems. I said stop wasting energy and stop wasting words.
Study the work of Adam Kahane and learn how to talk to each other about difficult issues. If Adam can do it with people that have been killing each other for decades, we can do it with the inflammatory dialogue of the environment and electricity generation debate. The so called choice between the economy and the environment is a false choice. The environment is the economy (and I am tempted to violate my own beliefs and add “stupid”, but I won’t).
We must develop a generative dialogue to realize that we all agree that the earth is our only home. We must make collective decisions about how and what we spew. We should decide together when, where and why we degrade. We must face and answer the question about what we do about waste. In the long run we must reduce even the distant potential to harm our health and the health of our children through toxins, climate change and reduced air quality. Our very lives depend on it. It will not serve the future well to stay in divisive arguments. We must come together and agree on mutually understood facts. We must take decisive steps to make this world the kind of earth on which we can all live healthy and productive lives for all eternity. We cannot keep borrowing the future from our children and hope new technology bails us out. We cannot keep ignoring the elephant in the living room without catastrophic impacts to our homes. We cannot keep calling each other names and expect to ever have the kind of world that we know in our hearts is possible.
Please, let’s all do something today to take action on those two things that we can do. Stop wasting energy and stop wasting words. We could call it Vision Power Generation. Make it all count.
Next time in the interests of fair play, I‘ll explain why environmentalists think Utility Executives are a pain in the ass.
©Mark Richard Daily, 2008
Think of your own profession or job. Would you like it if people referred to what you were doing with words like “toxic”, “destruction”, “degradation”, “waste”, “monopoly”, “cancer” or my favorite derogatory word “spew”. What have you been spewing today? Did you spew your product on anyone?
How about degradation? Have you degraded anything today?
While most businesses secretly wish they were monopolies, no one likes to be accused of being one. It just isn’t the American way.
So, imagine recent headlines referring to the electric utility industry. Oh, I know, I am going to exaggerate a little for effect, but still you can imagine a headline like this in your local newspaper.
“Electric Monopoly Spews Toxic Destruction Degrading Air quality linked to Cancer”.
It’s like the old conundrum “when did you stop beating your wife”? Environmentalists lead with a verbal left hook. And, it seems like the only reason they would do that is to get headlines or make someone angry. If you had a neighbor with a barking dog or a messy yard, you wouldn’t storm over there demanding and accusing, unless you just like fist fighting. You’d get to know them first and find out if there were extenuating reasons for their behavior. Chances are there is more to the story. You know that. And the Electric Utility industry is in the same spot, there is more to the story. In fact, all of us that love our computers, televisions, cold beer, toast, light after dark, and inexpensive consumer goods, are all – the rest of the story.
Today we are stuck in what peace activist Adam Kahane calls “debating”. We have each side shouting their view of the facts hoping to drown out the other’s argument. One side says, “We can power the economy with a combination of wind, solar and conservation”. The other side shouts back, “No we cannot, the load growth is too large, we must use fossil fuels and expand nuclear power”.
What can we do about all of this? We can and must do two things. Stop wasting electricity and stop wasting words about solving environmental problems. I did not say stop using electricity (we can’t). Nor did I say stop having conversations about environmental problems. I said stop wasting energy and stop wasting words.
Study the work of Adam Kahane and learn how to talk to each other about difficult issues. If Adam can do it with people that have been killing each other for decades, we can do it with the inflammatory dialogue of the environment and electricity generation debate. The so called choice between the economy and the environment is a false choice. The environment is the economy (and I am tempted to violate my own beliefs and add “stupid”, but I won’t).
We must develop a generative dialogue to realize that we all agree that the earth is our only home. We must make collective decisions about how and what we spew. We should decide together when, where and why we degrade. We must face and answer the question about what we do about waste. In the long run we must reduce even the distant potential to harm our health and the health of our children through toxins, climate change and reduced air quality. Our very lives depend on it. It will not serve the future well to stay in divisive arguments. We must come together and agree on mutually understood facts. We must take decisive steps to make this world the kind of earth on which we can all live healthy and productive lives for all eternity. We cannot keep borrowing the future from our children and hope new technology bails us out. We cannot keep ignoring the elephant in the living room without catastrophic impacts to our homes. We cannot keep calling each other names and expect to ever have the kind of world that we know in our hearts is possible.
Please, let’s all do something today to take action on those two things that we can do. Stop wasting energy and stop wasting words. We could call it Vision Power Generation. Make it all count.
Next time in the interests of fair play, I‘ll explain why environmentalists think Utility Executives are a pain in the ass.
©Mark Richard Daily, 2008
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Why Utility Executives Hate Renewable Energy Portfolio Standards
Did you ever wonder why Renewable Energy provides less than ten percent of this nation’s electric energy? What the heck is an RPS and why should you take action to support them? And, finally if RPS’s are such a good idea, why do many utility executives hate them?
Defining Renewable Portfolio Standards
Renewable Portfolio Standards are not exactly on everyone’s mind these days. A Google search of RPS is just as likely to turn up sites about Rock – Paper – Scissors. Some insist that RPS is a game, but for states moving ahead with renewable energy industries, Renewable Portfolio Standards, sometimes called Renewable Electricity Standards, can be just the extra push that renewables need to become a big player in the electric energy generation game.
“A renewable portfolio standard is a state policy that requires electricity providers to obtain a minimum percentage of their power from renewable energy resources by a certain date. Currently there are 24 states plus the District of Columbia that have RPS policies in place. Together these states account for more than half of the electricity sales in the United States.
Four other states, Illinois, Missouri, Virginia, and Vermont, have nonbinding goals for adoption of renewable energy instead of an RPS.
Three states, Missouri, Virginia, and Vermont, have set voluntary goals for adopting renewable energy instead of portfolio standards with binding targets.”
Source: Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, U.S. Department of Energy
Today renewable energy makes up less than 10% of the generation mix anywhere in the nation. And, 8% of that is from conventional large hydroelectric dam facilities. Wind generation even with its recent strong growth amounts to less than 1% of the generation mix and solar comes in at 0.04% of the generation resource in 2005.
Non-renewable resources mostly fossil fuel related, still account for 89.9% of the electricity generated in the USA.
Utility Executives Hate Renewable Portfolio Standards
So, why do some utility executives appose Renewable Portfolio Standards? It’s simple. No one likes it when someone else tells them what to do, especially when that someone else is outside the industry and expertise of that industry. Utility executives feel that the public is ill-informed about the true costs of electric energy generation. Utility executives with electrical engineering background especially feel that the public has arrived at their “pro-renewable” stance based on incomplete or faulty information. “If you knew what I know….,” you can hear them saying.
Frankly, I think that these executives are right. You don’t have to review too many of my previous blogs to find examples of misguided renewable cheerleaders getting carried away with a few acts or ignoring the facts all together. One mission of this blog is to correct that lack of information. The Union of Concerned Scientists must feel the same way because their FAQ does a pretty nice job of answering those happy hour questions about renewable energy.
Despite gains made in renewable energy production and in spite of the fact that the “fuel” for wind and solar energy is free, the fact still remains that all renewable energy resources cost more to get into the grid than non-renewable energy.
The Bottom Line for Renewable Energy
So, here is the real reason utility executives hate RPS. It raises rates and these guys have never ever gotten one phone call from any of their consumers yelling at them for having rates that were too low. Oh no my friends. I know from personal experience being the main person fielding angry customer complaints that I never, ever in fifteen years of dealing with angry customers – had a customer angry with me because rates were too low; quite the opposite in fact. And, since utility executives are trying to deliver electricity at the best rates possible, no one wants to be forced into RPS regulations mandating higher rates. Or, worse yet mandating rate freezes while requiring RPS targets, similar to what the retail deregulation experience did in many states.
A recent study by American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy of the financial impacts of RPS adoption shows that over all energy costs would go down but the cost savings do not happen right away and this study shows that electricity rates by themselves go up as a result of RPS implementation.
Renewable Energy Management
Renewable Energy tends to be a small scale disbursed generation resource. This requires more coordination for dispatching electricity to the load or demand centers that need the juice. Having a host of renewable energy resource generators to coordinate instead of one huge coal fired power plant gives utility executives nightmares. While there can be positive aspects to a more widely distributed generation resource, there is also the real possibility that making the system more complicated will lead to more system failures, brown-outs and black outs from mistakes made in the dispatch process.
What Can You Do to help Push Renewable Energy Electricity Generation and RPS forward?
So, how do we get around this opposition and get state legislators to adopt renewable portfolio standards?
There are three things that you must do to save the world.
First, know what you are talking about. Get the facts. Find out what alternate energy can really do. Parroting phrases like, “the State of Nevada has enough solar energy to power the entire US economy” is counter-productive. This may be a true statement, but unless you support extensive transmission line construction, no one cares what happens in Nevada.
Second, become a vocal, but polite voice advocating renewable energy development through the adoption of Renewable Energy or Renewable Electricity Portfolio Standards. Write to state and national elected officials and your utility executives and tell them that you support higher rates as long as those increases go toward the addition of renewable energy resources in their generation portfolios.
Finally the absolute most important thing that you can do to help renewable energy become a bigger percentage of the electricity generation mix is stop using electricity stupidly. This is more than just turning the lights off. Residential lighting in the US accounts for only about five percent of the entire electric energy demand. So even if you use headlamps all the time you haven’t done much to reduce energy use. Energy conservation means doing the same work smarter, by buying the most energy efficient appliances; hunting down and eliminating phantom electric loads in your house; making sure your home has the best insulation levels and high quality windows possible. Utility executives are not generating electricity because it’s a lot of fun. They are generating electricity because you are asking for it. Read some previous postings to find out more about energy conservation.
My next Blog will explain why utility executives think environmentalists are a pain in the ass.
©Mark Richard Daily
Defining Renewable Portfolio Standards
Renewable Portfolio Standards are not exactly on everyone’s mind these days. A Google search of RPS is just as likely to turn up sites about Rock – Paper – Scissors. Some insist that RPS is a game, but for states moving ahead with renewable energy industries, Renewable Portfolio Standards, sometimes called Renewable Electricity Standards, can be just the extra push that renewables need to become a big player in the electric energy generation game.
“A renewable portfolio standard is a state policy that requires electricity providers to obtain a minimum percentage of their power from renewable energy resources by a certain date. Currently there are 24 states plus the District of Columbia that have RPS policies in place. Together these states account for more than half of the electricity sales in the United States.
Four other states, Illinois, Missouri, Virginia, and Vermont, have nonbinding goals for adoption of renewable energy instead of an RPS.
Three states, Missouri, Virginia, and Vermont, have set voluntary goals for adopting renewable energy instead of portfolio standards with binding targets.”
Source: Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, U.S. Department of Energy
Today renewable energy makes up less than 10% of the generation mix anywhere in the nation. And, 8% of that is from conventional large hydroelectric dam facilities. Wind generation even with its recent strong growth amounts to less than 1% of the generation mix and solar comes in at 0.04% of the generation resource in 2005.
Non-renewable resources mostly fossil fuel related, still account for 89.9% of the electricity generated in the USA.
Utility Executives Hate Renewable Portfolio Standards
So, why do some utility executives appose Renewable Portfolio Standards? It’s simple. No one likes it when someone else tells them what to do, especially when that someone else is outside the industry and expertise of that industry. Utility executives feel that the public is ill-informed about the true costs of electric energy generation. Utility executives with electrical engineering background especially feel that the public has arrived at their “pro-renewable” stance based on incomplete or faulty information. “If you knew what I know….,” you can hear them saying.
Frankly, I think that these executives are right. You don’t have to review too many of my previous blogs to find examples of misguided renewable cheerleaders getting carried away with a few acts or ignoring the facts all together. One mission of this blog is to correct that lack of information. The Union of Concerned Scientists must feel the same way because their FAQ does a pretty nice job of answering those happy hour questions about renewable energy.
Despite gains made in renewable energy production and in spite of the fact that the “fuel” for wind and solar energy is free, the fact still remains that all renewable energy resources cost more to get into the grid than non-renewable energy.
The Bottom Line for Renewable Energy
So, here is the real reason utility executives hate RPS. It raises rates and these guys have never ever gotten one phone call from any of their consumers yelling at them for having rates that were too low. Oh no my friends. I know from personal experience being the main person fielding angry customer complaints that I never, ever in fifteen years of dealing with angry customers – had a customer angry with me because rates were too low; quite the opposite in fact. And, since utility executives are trying to deliver electricity at the best rates possible, no one wants to be forced into RPS regulations mandating higher rates. Or, worse yet mandating rate freezes while requiring RPS targets, similar to what the retail deregulation experience did in many states.
A recent study by American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy of the financial impacts of RPS adoption shows that over all energy costs would go down but the cost savings do not happen right away and this study shows that electricity rates by themselves go up as a result of RPS implementation.
Renewable Energy Management
Renewable Energy tends to be a small scale disbursed generation resource. This requires more coordination for dispatching electricity to the load or demand centers that need the juice. Having a host of renewable energy resource generators to coordinate instead of one huge coal fired power plant gives utility executives nightmares. While there can be positive aspects to a more widely distributed generation resource, there is also the real possibility that making the system more complicated will lead to more system failures, brown-outs and black outs from mistakes made in the dispatch process.
What Can You Do to help Push Renewable Energy Electricity Generation and RPS forward?
So, how do we get around this opposition and get state legislators to adopt renewable portfolio standards?
There are three things that you must do to save the world.
First, know what you are talking about. Get the facts. Find out what alternate energy can really do. Parroting phrases like, “the State of Nevada has enough solar energy to power the entire US economy” is counter-productive. This may be a true statement, but unless you support extensive transmission line construction, no one cares what happens in Nevada.
Second, become a vocal, but polite voice advocating renewable energy development through the adoption of Renewable Energy or Renewable Electricity Portfolio Standards. Write to state and national elected officials and your utility executives and tell them that you support higher rates as long as those increases go toward the addition of renewable energy resources in their generation portfolios.
Finally the absolute most important thing that you can do to help renewable energy become a bigger percentage of the electricity generation mix is stop using electricity stupidly. This is more than just turning the lights off. Residential lighting in the US accounts for only about five percent of the entire electric energy demand. So even if you use headlamps all the time you haven’t done much to reduce energy use. Energy conservation means doing the same work smarter, by buying the most energy efficient appliances; hunting down and eliminating phantom electric loads in your house; making sure your home has the best insulation levels and high quality windows possible. Utility executives are not generating electricity because it’s a lot of fun. They are generating electricity because you are asking for it. Read some previous postings to find out more about energy conservation.
My next Blog will explain why utility executives think environmentalists are a pain in the ass.
©Mark Richard Daily
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Why Electric Utility Executives Hate Net-Metering
Net- Metering is a specific utility term used to describe the way utilities may allow small home generators to feed electricity back onto their electric distribution wire grids.
The DSIRE database, (Data base of State Incentives for Renewable & Efficiency) lists each state’s renewable programs. They define net- metering like this:
“Net Metering Rules For those consumers who have their own electricity generating units, net metering allows for the flow of electricity both to and from the customer through a single, bi-directional meter. With net metering, during times when the customer's generation exceeds his or her use, electricity from the customer to the utility offsets electricity consumed at another time. In effect, the customer is using the excess generation to offset electricity that would have been purchased at the retail rate. Under most state rules, residential, commercial, and industrial customers are eligible for net metering, but some states restrict eligibility to particular customer classes.”
This is a widely accepted definition but gets confused by some utility programs that don’t really offer net-metering. Instead they offer wholesale or avoided cost metering. This often requires two meters installed at the customer’s expense. One meter records the kWh flowing into their house from the utility grid and the other meter records the flow of electricity from the home’s power generation sources like a PV array or small wind turbine. The market drives the cost of electricity just like it does other commodities and the price we all pay on our electric bill reflects market value as well as actual costs for delivery. In the case of small alternate energy generators, utilities typically pay a wholesale rate for any energy that they buy directly.
One myth that is often used to oppose net-metering is the myth that meters go forward more accurately than they go backwards. Eletromechanical meters have no physical reason to run any differently more or less accurately no matter which way the current is going. Yet, this is the reason that many utilities require two meters. Two meters doubles your minimum monthly service charge and throws an un-necessary obstacle into the net-metering road.
Utilities that offer true net-metering, allow one meter that goes both directions. With this arrangement, consumer’s gain by having any energy that they generate going back to cancel the incoming kWh hours.
Once the meter hits zero on the register the price changes. Now you are making a net contribution to the grid instead of just canceling out your utility company generated power. So, the price you make on each kWh goes down to the wholesale rate which is typically 40 to 60 percent less than the retail rate. So, if you are going to run payback numbers for your project, you need to find out the average retail rate per kWh when you calculate the financial benefits of installing your own net-metering equipment.
Safety has always been very important to electric utilities and rightfully so. You can’t make any mistakes handling 14,000 volts of electricity without serious – usually fatal consequences. So, may utilities require a long list of lock out safety requirements and a hefty insurance liability policy from homeowners interested in installing net metering equipment.
Some utilities require a physical lock out device accessible to utility personnel; all day every day so that they can isolate your system from the grid while they are working on distribution circuits effected by your system.
I heard a good talk several years ago by a knowledgeable engineer about the potential danger from net-metering facilities. He seemed to think that the likely hood of a 12 or 24 volt 1.5 to 3.0KW net-metering system back feeding enough voltage to injury a line worker was a remote possibility and said it really was not scientifically supportable. Yet many utilities still persist in adding this substantial obstacle to net- metering installations from home owners.
Today, there are several alternate energy system inverters that take care of most of the legitimate interconnection and safety issues raised by utility regulations.
The main problem with net metering relates to the way you get billed for electricity. In most locations there are two parts to your bill. One part is a kWh charge that is supposed to cover all of the costs of getting each kWh to your house from the generation facility. The other part of your bill has a fixed minimum monthly charge or availability of service fee that is supposed to cover those expenses that a distribution utility incurs whether you use any electricity or not. If you leave town and throw your main breaker to the off position, you will not use any kWh. But, your meter is still sitting there ready for action and the wires coming to your house are still in the air or under the ground waiting for something to do and the utility company still needs to send a meter reader or use software to read your meter remotely just in case you use some juice that month. These fixed costs, like property taxes, accounting expenses and administrative expenses continue whether you use electricity or not. Also these expenses are often so high that utilities bundle a portion of the fixed expense into your kWh charge. So, if you are a net-metering customer whose meter hits zero or generates a lot of your own power that displaces the utility grid power , you are cutting into their revenue, without making a meaningful contribution to cutting the costs for buying power during the night and on cloudy days.
What may change utility attitudes toward net-metering is the growing need for additional generation resources and the clamor over fossil fuel generation. Utility executives maybe looking for net-metering resources to fill in peak daytime loads when the sun is shining, thus taking some of the pressure off financing new fossil fuel resources.
Do you have a question about how your electricity gets to your house? Ask me. I'll try to find out? GOt any other questions about electric energy generation? Ask me. I'll get some answers.
The DSIRE database, (Data base of State Incentives for Renewable & Efficiency) lists each state’s renewable programs. They define net- metering like this:
“Net Metering Rules For those consumers who have their own electricity generating units, net metering allows for the flow of electricity both to and from the customer through a single, bi-directional meter. With net metering, during times when the customer's generation exceeds his or her use, electricity from the customer to the utility offsets electricity consumed at another time. In effect, the customer is using the excess generation to offset electricity that would have been purchased at the retail rate. Under most state rules, residential, commercial, and industrial customers are eligible for net metering, but some states restrict eligibility to particular customer classes.”
This is a widely accepted definition but gets confused by some utility programs that don’t really offer net-metering. Instead they offer wholesale or avoided cost metering. This often requires two meters installed at the customer’s expense. One meter records the kWh flowing into their house from the utility grid and the other meter records the flow of electricity from the home’s power generation sources like a PV array or small wind turbine. The market drives the cost of electricity just like it does other commodities and the price we all pay on our electric bill reflects market value as well as actual costs for delivery. In the case of small alternate energy generators, utilities typically pay a wholesale rate for any energy that they buy directly.
One myth that is often used to oppose net-metering is the myth that meters go forward more accurately than they go backwards. Eletromechanical meters have no physical reason to run any differently more or less accurately no matter which way the current is going. Yet, this is the reason that many utilities require two meters. Two meters doubles your minimum monthly service charge and throws an un-necessary obstacle into the net-metering road.
Utilities that offer true net-metering, allow one meter that goes both directions. With this arrangement, consumer’s gain by having any energy that they generate going back to cancel the incoming kWh hours.
Once the meter hits zero on the register the price changes. Now you are making a net contribution to the grid instead of just canceling out your utility company generated power. So, the price you make on each kWh goes down to the wholesale rate which is typically 40 to 60 percent less than the retail rate. So, if you are going to run payback numbers for your project, you need to find out the average retail rate per kWh when you calculate the financial benefits of installing your own net-metering equipment.
Safety has always been very important to electric utilities and rightfully so. You can’t make any mistakes handling 14,000 volts of electricity without serious – usually fatal consequences. So, may utilities require a long list of lock out safety requirements and a hefty insurance liability policy from homeowners interested in installing net metering equipment.
Some utilities require a physical lock out device accessible to utility personnel; all day every day so that they can isolate your system from the grid while they are working on distribution circuits effected by your system.
I heard a good talk several years ago by a knowledgeable engineer about the potential danger from net-metering facilities. He seemed to think that the likely hood of a 12 or 24 volt 1.5 to 3.0KW net-metering system back feeding enough voltage to injury a line worker was a remote possibility and said it really was not scientifically supportable. Yet many utilities still persist in adding this substantial obstacle to net- metering installations from home owners.
Today, there are several alternate energy system inverters that take care of most of the legitimate interconnection and safety issues raised by utility regulations.
The main problem with net metering relates to the way you get billed for electricity. In most locations there are two parts to your bill. One part is a kWh charge that is supposed to cover all of the costs of getting each kWh to your house from the generation facility. The other part of your bill has a fixed minimum monthly charge or availability of service fee that is supposed to cover those expenses that a distribution utility incurs whether you use any electricity or not. If you leave town and throw your main breaker to the off position, you will not use any kWh. But, your meter is still sitting there ready for action and the wires coming to your house are still in the air or under the ground waiting for something to do and the utility company still needs to send a meter reader or use software to read your meter remotely just in case you use some juice that month. These fixed costs, like property taxes, accounting expenses and administrative expenses continue whether you use electricity or not. Also these expenses are often so high that utilities bundle a portion of the fixed expense into your kWh charge. So, if you are a net-metering customer whose meter hits zero or generates a lot of your own power that displaces the utility grid power , you are cutting into their revenue, without making a meaningful contribution to cutting the costs for buying power during the night and on cloudy days.
What may change utility attitudes toward net-metering is the growing need for additional generation resources and the clamor over fossil fuel generation. Utility executives maybe looking for net-metering resources to fill in peak daytime loads when the sun is shining, thus taking some of the pressure off financing new fossil fuel resources.
Do you have a question about how your electricity gets to your house? Ask me. I'll try to find out? GOt any other questions about electric energy generation? Ask me. I'll get some answers.
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Air Permit Denial Threatens to Cost Consumers
Like the old Chinese curse, " may you live in interesting times", recent events could be on track for a perfect storm for electric utility generation, with electricity consumers caught in the middle and footing the bill as usual.
The convergence of recent US Supreme Court decisions, pending State and Federal government climate change legislation and citizen discussions about global warming put consumers at risk for a deluge of electric rate increases. Add a cold winter, or higher transportation and maintenance costs and the writing is on the wall. For those consumers that believe that current electricity rates are too low and do not reflect the external costs of air pollution created during electricity generation, the recent decision to deny power plant air quality permits in Kansas is a good decision. For those consumers struggling on fixed incomes or tight budgets, the decision may mean electric rates will continue to climb. That could be bad for everyone.
The Background
Tri-State G&T proposed the joint construction of the largest coal-fired power plant in the United States, to be built at the cost of $3.6 billion. The power plant with its two 700-megawatt generators was to be built and financed by several utilities including, Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association, Sunflower Electric Association, Golden Spread Electric Cooperative, Inc, and Midwest Energy.All four companies are member owned, non-profit cooperative corporations. The first three companies are wholesale power suppliers. Sunflower, organized in 1957, serves six rural electric distribution cooperatives in 34 western Kansas counties. Tri-State, started in 1952, is owned by and serves 44 electric cooperatives across portions of Colorado, Nebraska, New Mexico and Wyoming. Golden Spread Electric Cooperative was founded in 1984 and serves 16 distribution cooperatives in Oklahoma and Texas. Midwest Energy serves customers in central and western Kansas.
The new power plants are planned as an expansion to existing power generation facilities owned by Sunflower on their 10,000-acre, 360-megawatt Holcomb Station site. This is located approximately four miles south of Holcomb, Kansas.
The original plan was for Golden Spread, Sunflower, Tri-State and other investors to jointly own the first new 700-megawatt unit. Construction of the first unit was planned to begin in 2007 and be operational in 2012. Golden Spread planed to own 400 megawatts of the unit’s output for supply to its member systems. Sunflower expected to provide up to 150 megawatts to its member systems, and Midwest Energy was in for 75 megawatts. Tri-State planned to own the second 700-megawatt unit, to supply power to its member systems. This unit was projected to be online in 2013, but recent proposals before the denial show Tri-State postponing construction and tying the construction schedule to future load growth.
The Denial
According to an October 18, 2007 Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE), press release concern over carbon dioxide production was the key factor in permit denial. Bolstered by the recent US Supreme Court decision (Massachusetts v. EPA), KHDE Secretary Roderick L. Bremby, stated, "I believe it would be irresponsible to ignore emerging information about the contribution of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to climate change and the potential harm to our environment and health if we do nothing".
Massachusetts v. EPA defined carbon dioxide ( CO2) as an air quality pollutant that should be regulated by the EPA. The 66 page Supreme Court Opinion refers to specific scientific studies and reports documenting the existing and predicted negative impacts from global climate change and ties these changes directly to human activity; specifically the accelerated production of green house gases. Carbon dioxide heads the list of these green house gas emissions.
The EPA defines coal fired electricity generation as the single largest source of CO2 emissions in the USA. Coal fired electricity generation exceeds CO2 emissions from the entire transportation sector.
This permit denial is the first such denial in the nation."We are disappointed with the Secretary's arbitrary and capricious action," said Earl Watkins, Sunflower's president and chief executive officer. Those disappointed with the denial point out the neither the EPA or the State of Kansas include CO2 as a regulated air pollutant. Project partners felt that they had met all environmental and regulatory requirements with their proposal.
This action also changes Sunflower's plans to invest in and advance algae technology that would use carbon dioxide from the power plants. Attempting to address carbon emissions, the project partners completed initial testing for an innovative algae reactor that would use a portion of the carbon dioxide emissions from Holcomb Station to produce biofuels, including ethanol and biodiesel. Funds that would have been earned from the power plant expansion project were expected to be used to finance Sunflower's investment in the commercial algae reactor.
The Next Step
Tri-State's general counsel Ken Reif reported to the G&T's employees, "Naturally we are all disappointed in this action and we are in the process of evaluating our options with Sunflower and our board."
Sunflower’s President and CEO Watkins said, "Politics aside, the 1.5 million cooperative customers still need reliable, low- cost power. We will endeavor to fulfill that mission in the appropriate way, but those customers will be harmed and the economy damaged by the Secretary's decision. Sunflower expects to pursue legal and legislative remedies to this denial."
Talk about Denial
Wholesale power utilities still do not get it. They continue to promote misleading statements regarding global warming or climate change and insist that decisions are being made based on emotion and "politics" rather than science. If it wasn’t for "politics", utilities and consumers would have been paying higher generation rates for decades to account for externalities - pollution etc., caused by fossil fuel electricity generation. Some argue that as soon as electricity becomes expensive enough to be worth saving, energy conservation will finally kick in and become a serious part of demand side management, instead of the token savings that it is inmost homes today.
In any case the Kansas Department of Health and Environment took one of the first steps toward new thinking and new energy solutions. In these interesting times it will be very interesting to see the impact that this permit decision has on other coal fired power plant construction plans across the nation. It will be even be more interesting to see how utilities meet the growing national demand for electricity with limited generation resources and a growing demand for climate change action.
© 2007Mark Daily
The convergence of recent US Supreme Court decisions, pending State and Federal government climate change legislation and citizen discussions about global warming put consumers at risk for a deluge of electric rate increases. Add a cold winter, or higher transportation and maintenance costs and the writing is on the wall. For those consumers that believe that current electricity rates are too low and do not reflect the external costs of air pollution created during electricity generation, the recent decision to deny power plant air quality permits in Kansas is a good decision. For those consumers struggling on fixed incomes or tight budgets, the decision may mean electric rates will continue to climb. That could be bad for everyone.
The Background
Tri-State G&T proposed the joint construction of the largest coal-fired power plant in the United States, to be built at the cost of $3.6 billion. The power plant with its two 700-megawatt generators was to be built and financed by several utilities including, Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association, Sunflower Electric Association, Golden Spread Electric Cooperative, Inc, and Midwest Energy.All four companies are member owned, non-profit cooperative corporations. The first three companies are wholesale power suppliers. Sunflower, organized in 1957, serves six rural electric distribution cooperatives in 34 western Kansas counties. Tri-State, started in 1952, is owned by and serves 44 electric cooperatives across portions of Colorado, Nebraska, New Mexico and Wyoming. Golden Spread Electric Cooperative was founded in 1984 and serves 16 distribution cooperatives in Oklahoma and Texas. Midwest Energy serves customers in central and western Kansas.
The new power plants are planned as an expansion to existing power generation facilities owned by Sunflower on their 10,000-acre, 360-megawatt Holcomb Station site. This is located approximately four miles south of Holcomb, Kansas.
The original plan was for Golden Spread, Sunflower, Tri-State and other investors to jointly own the first new 700-megawatt unit. Construction of the first unit was planned to begin in 2007 and be operational in 2012. Golden Spread planed to own 400 megawatts of the unit’s output for supply to its member systems. Sunflower expected to provide up to 150 megawatts to its member systems, and Midwest Energy was in for 75 megawatts. Tri-State planned to own the second 700-megawatt unit, to supply power to its member systems. This unit was projected to be online in 2013, but recent proposals before the denial show Tri-State postponing construction and tying the construction schedule to future load growth.
The Denial
According to an October 18, 2007 Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE), press release concern over carbon dioxide production was the key factor in permit denial. Bolstered by the recent US Supreme Court decision (Massachusetts v. EPA), KHDE Secretary Roderick L. Bremby, stated, "I believe it would be irresponsible to ignore emerging information about the contribution of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to climate change and the potential harm to our environment and health if we do nothing".
Massachusetts v. EPA defined carbon dioxide ( CO2) as an air quality pollutant that should be regulated by the EPA. The 66 page Supreme Court Opinion refers to specific scientific studies and reports documenting the existing and predicted negative impacts from global climate change and ties these changes directly to human activity; specifically the accelerated production of green house gases. Carbon dioxide heads the list of these green house gas emissions.
The EPA defines coal fired electricity generation as the single largest source of CO2 emissions in the USA. Coal fired electricity generation exceeds CO2 emissions from the entire transportation sector.
This permit denial is the first such denial in the nation."We are disappointed with the Secretary's arbitrary and capricious action," said Earl Watkins, Sunflower's president and chief executive officer. Those disappointed with the denial point out the neither the EPA or the State of Kansas include CO2 as a regulated air pollutant. Project partners felt that they had met all environmental and regulatory requirements with their proposal.
This action also changes Sunflower's plans to invest in and advance algae technology that would use carbon dioxide from the power plants. Attempting to address carbon emissions, the project partners completed initial testing for an innovative algae reactor that would use a portion of the carbon dioxide emissions from Holcomb Station to produce biofuels, including ethanol and biodiesel. Funds that would have been earned from the power plant expansion project were expected to be used to finance Sunflower's investment in the commercial algae reactor.
The Next Step
Tri-State's general counsel Ken Reif reported to the G&T's employees, "Naturally we are all disappointed in this action and we are in the process of evaluating our options with Sunflower and our board."
Sunflower’s President and CEO Watkins said, "Politics aside, the 1.5 million cooperative customers still need reliable, low- cost power. We will endeavor to fulfill that mission in the appropriate way, but those customers will be harmed and the economy damaged by the Secretary's decision. Sunflower expects to pursue legal and legislative remedies to this denial."
Talk about Denial
Wholesale power utilities still do not get it. They continue to promote misleading statements regarding global warming or climate change and insist that decisions are being made based on emotion and "politics" rather than science. If it wasn’t for "politics", utilities and consumers would have been paying higher generation rates for decades to account for externalities - pollution etc., caused by fossil fuel electricity generation. Some argue that as soon as electricity becomes expensive enough to be worth saving, energy conservation will finally kick in and become a serious part of demand side management, instead of the token savings that it is inmost homes today.
In any case the Kansas Department of Health and Environment took one of the first steps toward new thinking and new energy solutions. In these interesting times it will be very interesting to see the impact that this permit decision has on other coal fired power plant construction plans across the nation. It will be even be more interesting to see how utilities meet the growing national demand for electricity with limited generation resources and a growing demand for climate change action.
© 2007Mark Daily
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Electricity Generation Requires a New Way to Talk and Listen
We could save the Universe if we just learned how to talk to each other. In 2002 Adam Kahane wrote a wonderful article called "Changing the World by Changing How We Talk and Listen". Mr. Kahane lays out a compelling argument for why so many of our most complicated world problems never get solved. Not only do they never get solved, but some problems never seem to change. The vitriolic arguments use the same words and phrases over and over again until all sides are red in the face with frustration. While his article draws from his experience mediating factions during the Guatamala’s peace vision, his principles apply well to any area of conflict. He clearly shows why frustration grows and how to resolve it.
Today frustration is growing in the great debate about how to power our modern society. And, this debate is now officially mainstream as of last night. Last night I saw a REMAX Real Estate television commercial with a sharp looking couple cheerfully telling their wonderful REMAX real estate agent that they wanted a home powered by solar and wind energy and maybe even bio- gases. Then the mythical wife wrinkles her nose as pictures of dairy cows swirl by while she says, "Well, maybe not methane gas".
Living technicolor proof that what Carl Sagan said long ago is true now more than ever. "We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology."
One solution may be to follow Adam Kahane’s prescription for talking and listening. He claims that there are "four distinct conversational modes". Every discussion, whether it focuses on how to stop the genocide of pregnant women stacked like cord wood in a mass grave or how to create electric energy reliability without green house gases, must go through each of these four distinct conversational modes. These modes are "Downloading, Debating, Reflective Dialogue and Generative Dialogue". No long term solutions to any serious problems have ever occurred without the stake holders or effected players getting together and working through all four of these modes in order. You can’t skip any of the steps and you can’t change the order of the progression without destroying trust. And trust, is the foundation of any problem’s solution. It can only be obtained if each mode is played out in order.
Today the electric industry, environmental groups, and your average electricity customer are stuck somewhere between Downloading and Debating. Downloading occurs when stakeholders repeat facts about their solution over and over again. They list the reasons their special solution is the only answer to the problem and they repeatedly dismiss anyone else’s solution as unrealistic. In our current debate, this is why utility executives fight tooth and toe nail against renewable portfolio standards and why environmental groups continually deride, coal, nuclear and large hydro power projects. Downloading keeps everyone stuck in a constant shouting match about potential solutions while one side accuses the other side of not understanding the real problem and not have the sense or vision to propose a real world solution. While we must go through this part of the discussion, Downloading offers nothing new. All sides get stuck in their own self confidence believing they have the solution while belittling other solutions. We don’t need more facts about fuels. We need to go beyond downloading facts to come up with a radical new solution. This is not an argument to wait until technology saves us with a magic energy pill. It is a plea for us to get the objective facts on the table and move to the next step.
Downloading "facts" as both sides see it, sets up the second mode of communication - Debating. Here we see more of what "is" but offer no new solutions to the problem. We talk about more coal or add the concept of clean coal. We talk about more solar and add Concentrating Solar Power. We throw acronyms around like CSP and IGCC. The discussion logjams into talking heads and dueling experts with the consumer shaking their heads in disgust as they head for the fridge for another cold beer. Debating fosters winners and losers, without getting to the real understanding of other solutions or the role of all solutions in solving the problem. This won’t happen until debating ends and understanding begins to dawn on all of the players.
This is where Reflective dialogue comes into play. It’s the light bulb going on when the person realizes," Oh yeah, I see now that a photovoltaic system will not meet my energy needs if I continue to demand this level of power". Or, it’s the utility executive that really begins to see that some of his customers are bailing from central station grids, changing their life styles to allow small scale wind and solar systems to meet their energy needs. Its making realistic assessments about the role of energy conservation. Its getting into each other’s heads and gaining empathy for the real world situation that the other person is coming from. Reflective Dialogue will not produce the answers to the puzzle, but it will set up the trust and understanding that is vital to getting to what Steven Covey calls the "Third Alternative". That is the solution that makes everyone pretty happy without making anyone feel terribly mad. It makes all stake holders winners because through Reflective dialogue they finally understand why that crazy SOB thinks the way that they think. It begins to give validity to multiple solutions and sets the foundation for the next mode of dialogue, Generative Dialogue.
According to Kahane, Generative Dialogue produces a "deeper unity of purpose". The big light bulb finally gets lit in each and every stake holder and every one realizes that the only way to stop the atrocities of war or save the world from energy related side effects , or power civilization without destroying it, is to come together and work together on that "Third Alternative" . The alternative that makes every stake holder look like a hero to their constituents. It’s the solution that allows everyone to go home with their heads held high taking rightful credit for solving the problem without sacrificing their sense of what is right.
This is where we as a nation and a world need to go when it comes to deciding our energy future. When history is written describing how this generation met the challenges of our time and produced a workable and healthy energy solution to power the future, the record will show that we went through each of these "four distinct conversational modes".
We must keep this conversation going until we can all collectively make it through all four modes. As the Guatemalans found during their peace initiative, the stakes are way too high to do anything else. Does this mean that all we have to do is go through the four steps and like the addict finishing the twelve step rehabilitation program all problems are solved? Of course not. There will be good days and bad days. There will still be debates and downloading, setbacks and discouragement. Clearly, the methods being used to solve the problem today are not working. Its time to try something different. "Insanity is repeating the same behavior and expecting a different result," said Werner Erhart.
It is time to stop the insanity.
Today frustration is growing in the great debate about how to power our modern society. And, this debate is now officially mainstream as of last night. Last night I saw a REMAX Real Estate television commercial with a sharp looking couple cheerfully telling their wonderful REMAX real estate agent that they wanted a home powered by solar and wind energy and maybe even bio- gases. Then the mythical wife wrinkles her nose as pictures of dairy cows swirl by while she says, "Well, maybe not methane gas".
Living technicolor proof that what Carl Sagan said long ago is true now more than ever. "We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology."
One solution may be to follow Adam Kahane’s prescription for talking and listening. He claims that there are "four distinct conversational modes". Every discussion, whether it focuses on how to stop the genocide of pregnant women stacked like cord wood in a mass grave or how to create electric energy reliability without green house gases, must go through each of these four distinct conversational modes. These modes are "Downloading, Debating, Reflective Dialogue and Generative Dialogue". No long term solutions to any serious problems have ever occurred without the stake holders or effected players getting together and working through all four of these modes in order. You can’t skip any of the steps and you can’t change the order of the progression without destroying trust. And trust, is the foundation of any problem’s solution. It can only be obtained if each mode is played out in order.
Today the electric industry, environmental groups, and your average electricity customer are stuck somewhere between Downloading and Debating. Downloading occurs when stakeholders repeat facts about their solution over and over again. They list the reasons their special solution is the only answer to the problem and they repeatedly dismiss anyone else’s solution as unrealistic. In our current debate, this is why utility executives fight tooth and toe nail against renewable portfolio standards and why environmental groups continually deride, coal, nuclear and large hydro power projects. Downloading keeps everyone stuck in a constant shouting match about potential solutions while one side accuses the other side of not understanding the real problem and not have the sense or vision to propose a real world solution. While we must go through this part of the discussion, Downloading offers nothing new. All sides get stuck in their own self confidence believing they have the solution while belittling other solutions. We don’t need more facts about fuels. We need to go beyond downloading facts to come up with a radical new solution. This is not an argument to wait until technology saves us with a magic energy pill. It is a plea for us to get the objective facts on the table and move to the next step.
Downloading "facts" as both sides see it, sets up the second mode of communication - Debating. Here we see more of what "is" but offer no new solutions to the problem. We talk about more coal or add the concept of clean coal. We talk about more solar and add Concentrating Solar Power. We throw acronyms around like CSP and IGCC. The discussion logjams into talking heads and dueling experts with the consumer shaking their heads in disgust as they head for the fridge for another cold beer. Debating fosters winners and losers, without getting to the real understanding of other solutions or the role of all solutions in solving the problem. This won’t happen until debating ends and understanding begins to dawn on all of the players.
This is where Reflective dialogue comes into play. It’s the light bulb going on when the person realizes," Oh yeah, I see now that a photovoltaic system will not meet my energy needs if I continue to demand this level of power". Or, it’s the utility executive that really begins to see that some of his customers are bailing from central station grids, changing their life styles to allow small scale wind and solar systems to meet their energy needs. Its making realistic assessments about the role of energy conservation. Its getting into each other’s heads and gaining empathy for the real world situation that the other person is coming from. Reflective Dialogue will not produce the answers to the puzzle, but it will set up the trust and understanding that is vital to getting to what Steven Covey calls the "Third Alternative". That is the solution that makes everyone pretty happy without making anyone feel terribly mad. It makes all stake holders winners because through Reflective dialogue they finally understand why that crazy SOB thinks the way that they think. It begins to give validity to multiple solutions and sets the foundation for the next mode of dialogue, Generative Dialogue.
According to Kahane, Generative Dialogue produces a "deeper unity of purpose". The big light bulb finally gets lit in each and every stake holder and every one realizes that the only way to stop the atrocities of war or save the world from energy related side effects , or power civilization without destroying it, is to come together and work together on that "Third Alternative" . The alternative that makes every stake holder look like a hero to their constituents. It’s the solution that allows everyone to go home with their heads held high taking rightful credit for solving the problem without sacrificing their sense of what is right.
This is where we as a nation and a world need to go when it comes to deciding our energy future. When history is written describing how this generation met the challenges of our time and produced a workable and healthy energy solution to power the future, the record will show that we went through each of these "four distinct conversational modes".
We must keep this conversation going until we can all collectively make it through all four modes. As the Guatemalans found during their peace initiative, the stakes are way too high to do anything else. Does this mean that all we have to do is go through the four steps and like the addict finishing the twelve step rehabilitation program all problems are solved? Of course not. There will be good days and bad days. There will still be debates and downloading, setbacks and discouragement. Clearly, the methods being used to solve the problem today are not working. Its time to try something different. "Insanity is repeating the same behavior and expecting a different result," said Werner Erhart.
It is time to stop the insanity.
Sunday, February 4, 2007
Stop Building Power Plants- Get Smart
While CEO’s scurry around making grand plans to build more power plants and so called environmentalists lecture about the need for sustainable and renewable power, everyone is missing the point. Why Amory Lovins hasn’t gotten farther with his "Negawatts" concept is easy to see. When energy conservation meets your electricity needs, nobody makes the big bucks. And, it requires you to take action instead of blaming our energy problems on utilities, governments, or embryonic industries.
Many Western and Southern home owners could and are harnessing the sun. Plains and coastal states are harnessing the wind. Agricultural states could expand bio-fuels. Any place with garbage could do a better job making bio-gas. In many cases these technologies could be employed by home owners to power their homes, today; no waiting; no government action; no utility action. Yet, these solutions will take a big bite out of your wallet and require you to be the "utility company". The main problem is everyone wants to make sure that they have a wall street style payback and they want juice at the flip of the switch; without learning about battery storage levels or wind speeds. The other problem is that our homes and lifestyles are not built to conserve energy. The housing industry continues to confuse size and space with imagination. And, no one seems to be able to find south until after the house is built. So what’s a Boy Scout to do? It is still possible to conserve energy no matter what your house is like. The key is to learn what uses energy at your place and resolve to take action.
Enough free or low cost actions could be taken, that, when combined across the nation would have a real impact on our national energy appetite. The web has a plethora of sites devoted to energy audits and check lists for saving energy in the typical American home. If you haven’t visited them, this cold winter might be the time to start looking for ways you can save on your energy bill. If you are too lazy to do that, at least read this.
There really is no such thing as a typical American home. Size matters and so does construction, number of occupants, number of teenagers and the number and kind of appliances. Having said that, there are "typical" things that we know about homes.
The largest percentage of energy use in the American home goes to space heating. When it comes to space heating expenses, there are variables that you can so something about for a reasonable price and there are variables that you can’t touch unless you burn your house down and start over. This article focuses on simple non-flammable ideas.
The thermostat is a quick and easy way to cut costs. If you don’t have a programmable setback thermostat, you can save energy and pay for the cost of the new thermostat in about three winter months of heating or about four summer months of cooling. You can do this setback ritual by hand, but the only customer that I’ve known to pull this off was a Professor of Mathematics at a four year college. Even he got tired of it after several years. You save one percent off the heating part of your bill for every degree of set back you practice for ten hours or more a day. Other simple things that you can do to save on space heating costs include adding more air tight layers to windows ( plastic, glass, plexiglass) with more than 1/4 inch and less than 11/2 inches of space between each layer. One really simple thing you can do to lower heating costs is to take the screens off your south facing windows. This allows up to ten percent more of the sun’s heat to warm the inside of your house for free. Leaving drapes open during the day and closing them at night also helps. Leaving drapes closed on the south side is a really bad idea unless you just like sending money to your utility company. One other simple thing that you can do to cut heating costs is to caulk cracks and holes. I’ve read that 40 percent of a typical homes heating expense comes from air infiltration. When in, doubt caulk every inside joint where different construction materials meet. Or, better yet get a blower door test and find out exactly where the holes are. Many electric utilities offer a free or reduced cost blower door test service.
Water heating is the next biggest utility expense. Here again the thermostat is the first place to look. Most utilities have been recommending that water heater thermostats be set no higher than 120 degrees for years. On electric water heaters, you must make sure that both thermostats are set at the same temperature. There are almost always two thermostats on an electric water heater so keep looking until you find both. Adding an insulating blanket is the next best thing to do, unless your water heater warranty says, "no". Gas water heaters can also be insulated, but you must make sure that the installation meets all, and I mean all, safety requirements listed in your owners manual.
After that, doing all your laundry with cold water, installing low flow fixtures for showers and faucets and politely asking people to take shorter showers are about your only choices. There are some tips to getting good quality low flow fixtures. The styles that say "aerated" or "jet air" or something like that make the water travel a little faster and make you feel like you are getting more water. This is especially helpful for shower heads. If the box doesn’t brag about some special feature like this it probably means that the low flow is achieve by just choking off the water. This makes for wimpy showers.
Next on the energy evil doers list for the typical home is refrigeration. Unless you have to have rock hard ice cream and milk so cold it makes your teeth hurt, you can save some money here. You will need a thermometer to do this right. Most refrigerators have useless dials that say "colder" or "warmer". Obviously warmer is less expensive to run than colder but the Colorado State Health Department requires commercial coolers to be 40 Fahrenheit degrees plus or minus two degrees and freezing happens at 32 degrees Fahrenheit, so a thermometer works best. Here again you save one percent off the refrigeration part of your bill for every degree of setback you do. Two other easy saving tips for refrigerators include keeping the fridge full but not too full and keeping the back and bottom of the outside clean and dust free. Many homeowners keep a half full freezer in the garage, just incase they bring home some road kill. If its getting close to empty, stick the rest of it in your half empty freezer compartment of your regular fridge and unplug the freezer.
Then next biggest bite on your energy bill are your appliances. Unless you have a welding machine in the garage, this part of your bill is usually small. Lately news media have been fussing over "phanton loads" and blame today’s high tech "always on" appliances for this expense. The cost and the energy use for phantom loads are small. The only real way to find "phantom loads" and determine how much of a chunk they take out of your wallet is to get an appliance meter and check them. I got a Kill-O-Watt meter for Christmas several years ago and I like to experiment. My stereo has a remote control that powers it up and changes features and volume. As far as I can tell, it only uses electricity when the power is on. Somehow it hibernates very efficiently and draws zero power. My television on the other hand uses 8 watts all the time, even when it is turned off. This adds up to a whopping 69 cents per month. Some recent articles claim that you should install a light stick for these appliances and turn them off. You can spend $10.00 for a simple light stick and in fourteen months you will start saving 69 cents per month. You may also have to reprogram equipment when you kill the power. Only you can decide which way to go.
Lighting is one area that deserves attention. Its not that there are big savings to be had here, but its easy and it works. Fluorescent lighting offers more light per watt than regular incandescent or halogen bulbs. New LED lighting can offer even more savings, but the systems are harder to find and more expensive. There are also some fiber optic lights on the market that can save money over incandescent or halogen bulbs, but they are expensive to install.
In your home, compact fluorescent lights can take the place of any incandescent bulb as long as it fits into the fixture - some can’t. Always measure before you buy. A 16 watt compact fluorescent bulb can save you $36 dollars a year if you replace a 60 watt incandescent bulb that’s on 24 hours a day every day. Compact fluorescent bulbs last ten times as long making them ideal replacements for hard to reach places or commercial applications. Some compact fluorescent bulbs have a hard time starting in cold weather so use caution in outdoor applications. Having said that, I’ve used a 60 watt GE capsule compact fluorescent bulb on my front porch north of Gunnison, Colorado for years without problems. It protests a little when its below zero, but it always gets going after a few minutes.
The key to energy and cost savings in your home is self education. Knowing which pieces of equipment to keep an eye on is the best way to save money and avoid surprises. The following formula is the foundation to that education. Your electric bill equals watts divided by 1000, times Time times the rate per kWh. Or, $ = kW X T X $/kWh. While this is absurdly simple, the challenge of accurately filling in the blanks can drive you crazy. However, if you are serious about saving the universe, putting a halt to global climate change and saving your hard earned cash, you have to bite the bullet and learn this. New appliances and equipment usually have a label near the power cord that lists watts and amps or Kilowatts (KW) and amps. If you know kilowatts (KW) all you have to do is figure out Time, or how many hours a month it runs. Multiply KW times Time to get kWh. Then all you have to do is multiple by the rate. The national average must be up to $0.09 per kWh by now, but rates range from $0.08 to $0.14. That little difference makes a big difference on your bill, so find one of your old bills and get your kWh rate. If you know watts, divide by 1000 to get KW and then multiply by the rate.
For example, my television is so old (1988) that I can’t find anything on it to tell me how much power it uses, but I know it uses 74 watts when its on. I used my handy dandy Kill-O-Watt meter to get the number. If I watch two hours of television per day, in thirty days I use 4,440 watt hours of electricity. Dividing by 1,000 I come up with 4.44 kWh. Multiple that by the average rate of $0.09 and I can expect to pay 40 cents per month to watch television.
Larger appliances like baseboard electric heaters use more power. The watts of power for baseboard heaters is usually labeled on the front on a shiny silver tag. For a 1,000 watt heater that’s on six hours a day, the calculation looks like this:
1,000/1,000 X 6 X $0.09 X 30 days = $16.20 per month.
OK all you watt busters, mount up and ride. It doesn’t matter if you like Nuclear Power or Pulverized Coal or Integrated Combined Cycle Gasification, or Concentrated Solar Power, or Hydro-power or Wind power. New construction of any kind in this day and age will drive up your rates and your bill. Finding "Negawatts" could scare off some of these new power plant plans and keep your energy dollars in your wallet at the same time.
© Mark Daily
Many Western and Southern home owners could and are harnessing the sun. Plains and coastal states are harnessing the wind. Agricultural states could expand bio-fuels. Any place with garbage could do a better job making bio-gas. In many cases these technologies could be employed by home owners to power their homes, today; no waiting; no government action; no utility action. Yet, these solutions will take a big bite out of your wallet and require you to be the "utility company". The main problem is everyone wants to make sure that they have a wall street style payback and they want juice at the flip of the switch; without learning about battery storage levels or wind speeds. The other problem is that our homes and lifestyles are not built to conserve energy. The housing industry continues to confuse size and space with imagination. And, no one seems to be able to find south until after the house is built. So what’s a Boy Scout to do? It is still possible to conserve energy no matter what your house is like. The key is to learn what uses energy at your place and resolve to take action.
Enough free or low cost actions could be taken, that, when combined across the nation would have a real impact on our national energy appetite. The web has a plethora of sites devoted to energy audits and check lists for saving energy in the typical American home. If you haven’t visited them, this cold winter might be the time to start looking for ways you can save on your energy bill. If you are too lazy to do that, at least read this.
There really is no such thing as a typical American home. Size matters and so does construction, number of occupants, number of teenagers and the number and kind of appliances. Having said that, there are "typical" things that we know about homes.
The largest percentage of energy use in the American home goes to space heating. When it comes to space heating expenses, there are variables that you can so something about for a reasonable price and there are variables that you can’t touch unless you burn your house down and start over. This article focuses on simple non-flammable ideas.
The thermostat is a quick and easy way to cut costs. If you don’t have a programmable setback thermostat, you can save energy and pay for the cost of the new thermostat in about three winter months of heating or about four summer months of cooling. You can do this setback ritual by hand, but the only customer that I’ve known to pull this off was a Professor of Mathematics at a four year college. Even he got tired of it after several years. You save one percent off the heating part of your bill for every degree of set back you practice for ten hours or more a day. Other simple things that you can do to save on space heating costs include adding more air tight layers to windows ( plastic, glass, plexiglass) with more than 1/4 inch and less than 11/2 inches of space between each layer. One really simple thing you can do to lower heating costs is to take the screens off your south facing windows. This allows up to ten percent more of the sun’s heat to warm the inside of your house for free. Leaving drapes open during the day and closing them at night also helps. Leaving drapes closed on the south side is a really bad idea unless you just like sending money to your utility company. One other simple thing that you can do to cut heating costs is to caulk cracks and holes. I’ve read that 40 percent of a typical homes heating expense comes from air infiltration. When in, doubt caulk every inside joint where different construction materials meet. Or, better yet get a blower door test and find out exactly where the holes are. Many electric utilities offer a free or reduced cost blower door test service.
Water heating is the next biggest utility expense. Here again the thermostat is the first place to look. Most utilities have been recommending that water heater thermostats be set no higher than 120 degrees for years. On electric water heaters, you must make sure that both thermostats are set at the same temperature. There are almost always two thermostats on an electric water heater so keep looking until you find both. Adding an insulating blanket is the next best thing to do, unless your water heater warranty says, "no". Gas water heaters can also be insulated, but you must make sure that the installation meets all, and I mean all, safety requirements listed in your owners manual.
After that, doing all your laundry with cold water, installing low flow fixtures for showers and faucets and politely asking people to take shorter showers are about your only choices. There are some tips to getting good quality low flow fixtures. The styles that say "aerated" or "jet air" or something like that make the water travel a little faster and make you feel like you are getting more water. This is especially helpful for shower heads. If the box doesn’t brag about some special feature like this it probably means that the low flow is achieve by just choking off the water. This makes for wimpy showers.
Next on the energy evil doers list for the typical home is refrigeration. Unless you have to have rock hard ice cream and milk so cold it makes your teeth hurt, you can save some money here. You will need a thermometer to do this right. Most refrigerators have useless dials that say "colder" or "warmer". Obviously warmer is less expensive to run than colder but the Colorado State Health Department requires commercial coolers to be 40 Fahrenheit degrees plus or minus two degrees and freezing happens at 32 degrees Fahrenheit, so a thermometer works best. Here again you save one percent off the refrigeration part of your bill for every degree of setback you do. Two other easy saving tips for refrigerators include keeping the fridge full but not too full and keeping the back and bottom of the outside clean and dust free. Many homeowners keep a half full freezer in the garage, just incase they bring home some road kill. If its getting close to empty, stick the rest of it in your half empty freezer compartment of your regular fridge and unplug the freezer.
Then next biggest bite on your energy bill are your appliances. Unless you have a welding machine in the garage, this part of your bill is usually small. Lately news media have been fussing over "phanton loads" and blame today’s high tech "always on" appliances for this expense. The cost and the energy use for phantom loads are small. The only real way to find "phantom loads" and determine how much of a chunk they take out of your wallet is to get an appliance meter and check them. I got a Kill-O-Watt meter for Christmas several years ago and I like to experiment. My stereo has a remote control that powers it up and changes features and volume. As far as I can tell, it only uses electricity when the power is on. Somehow it hibernates very efficiently and draws zero power. My television on the other hand uses 8 watts all the time, even when it is turned off. This adds up to a whopping 69 cents per month. Some recent articles claim that you should install a light stick for these appliances and turn them off. You can spend $10.00 for a simple light stick and in fourteen months you will start saving 69 cents per month. You may also have to reprogram equipment when you kill the power. Only you can decide which way to go.
Lighting is one area that deserves attention. Its not that there are big savings to be had here, but its easy and it works. Fluorescent lighting offers more light per watt than regular incandescent or halogen bulbs. New LED lighting can offer even more savings, but the systems are harder to find and more expensive. There are also some fiber optic lights on the market that can save money over incandescent or halogen bulbs, but they are expensive to install.
In your home, compact fluorescent lights can take the place of any incandescent bulb as long as it fits into the fixture - some can’t. Always measure before you buy. A 16 watt compact fluorescent bulb can save you $36 dollars a year if you replace a 60 watt incandescent bulb that’s on 24 hours a day every day. Compact fluorescent bulbs last ten times as long making them ideal replacements for hard to reach places or commercial applications. Some compact fluorescent bulbs have a hard time starting in cold weather so use caution in outdoor applications. Having said that, I’ve used a 60 watt GE capsule compact fluorescent bulb on my front porch north of Gunnison, Colorado for years without problems. It protests a little when its below zero, but it always gets going after a few minutes.
The key to energy and cost savings in your home is self education. Knowing which pieces of equipment to keep an eye on is the best way to save money and avoid surprises. The following formula is the foundation to that education. Your electric bill equals watts divided by 1000, times Time times the rate per kWh. Or, $ = kW X T X $/kWh. While this is absurdly simple, the challenge of accurately filling in the blanks can drive you crazy. However, if you are serious about saving the universe, putting a halt to global climate change and saving your hard earned cash, you have to bite the bullet and learn this. New appliances and equipment usually have a label near the power cord that lists watts and amps or Kilowatts (KW) and amps. If you know kilowatts (KW) all you have to do is figure out Time, or how many hours a month it runs. Multiply KW times Time to get kWh. Then all you have to do is multiple by the rate. The national average must be up to $0.09 per kWh by now, but rates range from $0.08 to $0.14. That little difference makes a big difference on your bill, so find one of your old bills and get your kWh rate. If you know watts, divide by 1000 to get KW and then multiply by the rate.
For example, my television is so old (1988) that I can’t find anything on it to tell me how much power it uses, but I know it uses 74 watts when its on. I used my handy dandy Kill-O-Watt meter to get the number. If I watch two hours of television per day, in thirty days I use 4,440 watt hours of electricity. Dividing by 1,000 I come up with 4.44 kWh. Multiple that by the average rate of $0.09 and I can expect to pay 40 cents per month to watch television.
Larger appliances like baseboard electric heaters use more power. The watts of power for baseboard heaters is usually labeled on the front on a shiny silver tag. For a 1,000 watt heater that’s on six hours a day, the calculation looks like this:
1,000/1,000 X 6 X $0.09 X 30 days = $16.20 per month.
OK all you watt busters, mount up and ride. It doesn’t matter if you like Nuclear Power or Pulverized Coal or Integrated Combined Cycle Gasification, or Concentrated Solar Power, or Hydro-power or Wind power. New construction of any kind in this day and age will drive up your rates and your bill. Finding "Negawatts" could scare off some of these new power plant plans and keep your energy dollars in your wallet at the same time.
© Mark Daily
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